VS for a piece of Central legislation

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Opposition leader V S Achuthanandan has called for a piece of Central Legislation to ensure better wages and service conditions for nurses working in private hospitals in the country.As a sector involving a major women work force, utter discrimination was being shown to them,he said in a statement issued here on Saturday. The Opposition leader also called for a mechanism to put an end to the prevailing exploitation in hospitals in various parts of the country. Thousands of Malayalee nurses are working in various parts of the country and hence they are the worst-affected, he said.Achuthanandan said that instead of an eight-hour duty most of the hospitals were practising a 12-14 hour work pattern, with many of these institutions denying even a weekly-off and PF benefits. The nurses are not even permitted to quit, creating a slavery like situation.It was only recently that a Malayalee nurse had committed suicide, unable to bear the mental torture of a Mumbai-based hospital, eventually triggering an agitation of nurses across North India. Only a proper Central Legislation could bring in a permanent solution to this issue, he said.